The Devil's Dancefloor
by Mooncheese
Summary: Elizabeth is not the same person Will Turner left behind on an island five years ago...A response to ectofralamazoo's fic challenge.


Her hair was much longer now. The colour of straw and curling in a wild tangle almost to her hips. Her eyes were tired and bruised-looking, and her complexion was suntan and dirt. She was slumped by the bar with her eyes closed and for a moment, she looked almost as though the life had been kicked out of her.

Almost.

Approaching closer, he realised that her eyes were not closed at all - but open by the smallest fraction, watching him through the filthy cascades of hair over her face. Her body was not slumped in defeat with the world piled on her back, no, she was tensed and coiled, watching his approach keenly, with her lips slightly apart and a fine gleam of light in her eyes that told him - no - the world may have kicked her down, but she wasn't just about finished with the world yet.

With one fluid movement, he slid into the broken barstool beside her, and gazed directly into her face. God, the lass was getting good at feigning sleep, or even death, but it took a lot to fool Jack. Everything about her prickled with alertness, and as soon as he stroked a finger down one arm, she flinched violently.

"Fancy seeing you here, Elizabeth," he began casually, deliberately not removing his caress. "Frankly, I'm suprised you haven't burnt down the entire pub's stock of rum already."

For the first time, her face registered movement, and that old fiery glare at last flicked up to look at him. She sat up, shaking back her dirty shock of hair with a flash of her old Governor's daughter's pride. "Pirate Kings do need to frequent alehouse's upon occasion for...buisness reasons," she said primly, and although her voice was hoarse with drink and scratched with the rough talk of the variety of pirates she'd encountered in her beloved husband's absence, it remained skimmed with the polish of an upper class. Jack hid a smirk in his tankard, and eyed her attire. A worn, dirty and low cut dress clung to her slender frame, and he felt his pulse quicken slightly.

Before he could reply, strangely eerie, piping music from a wooden instrument whistled through the air behind them, and a drum beat in time with it. It was a complicated, light hearted tune that instantly caught at both of their ears and they turned, looking towards the players. A smile caught at the corners of Elizabeth's mouth, and for a moment, a flare of her old optimism shone through this new, hardened facade.

"I love this tune," she murmured, swaying her head to the beat.

Spontinuity caught Jack and, always having been one to obey his instincts, he smacked his tankard decisively on the cracked counter, caught her waist and pulled her to her feet.

"What are you doing?" she spluttered, as he starting leading her - or, to put it in a harsher and yet infinitely more truthful term, - dragging her, toward the wildly dancing mass of people all moving and skipping in time to the music.

"Taking you to dance, your nibbs," he replied, turning and dipping into a moderately graceful bow.

Elizabeth couldn't have looked more suprised if he'd told her he'd decided to give up rum. "You're - you're - _what_?" Recovering herself, she jerked her waist away from his grasp. "Don't be idiotic - I don't know the steps!"

He snorted. "What kind of Governor's daughter doesn't know the steps?" He raised an eyebrow at her. "Come on, love, how much more rum d'you need?"

Her face taughtened at the jibe, and suddenly she turned herself around to face him, raising one hand to press lightly on his shoulder, and the other stretched out in the air with a long-forgotten flourish. Flashing her a grin, he took her waist and grasped her hand, then with one movement, the two of them danced directly into the seething, wild mass of dancers.

Bodies were pressed all around them, everyone moving and leaping and laughing and drinking, everyone dancing to their own tune and all spellbound by the twisting, piping music that filled their heads. Their own bodies were squeezed together until their breath mingled and their feet knew no steps but their own invented ones, and yet somehow, miraculously, they were in time. Her eyes were everywhere, refusing to look into his, but he couldn't prevent himself from staring at her. Her hair was a wild mass of tangles, shaking back over her bare neck and shoulders, a smile lit up her face and her body leapt and swayed with the music. There was a delirious abandon in her movements, in every smile she flashed and laugh that gurgled from her throat.

It was odd, he reflected, that despite having seen her as a Governor's daughter with expensive dresses and neatly sculptured hair, he had never seen her more beautiful than she was right now, with untamed locks down past her waist, sweat in her eyes, drink on her breath and moving in his arms. With her face pressed to his and her words in his ear that he couldn't understand, with her arms around his neck and hanging on tight, with her body moving with his, in this seething mass of people, all inebriated to within an inch of their lives.

He held her equally tightly in their bubble of misunderstanding and longing and desire. She was a caged bird, continuing to sing despite the bars that held her in. And suddenly he pulled back from her, stroked down her face with his ringed fingers, and leaned towards her.

Their lips brushed together in a moment of startling contact. Her eyes met his for the first time since they had begun their dance, and there was a pause. Her hands clasped behind his neck, her hair flicking and swaying to the music, a fire in her eyes that was so different to the flame that used to burn there. Then she leaned towards him, catching his head in both hands and pulling his lips desperately towards hers.

It was a moment. Just one, single moment, standing pressed together in a riotous crowd of dancing, singing and drink-swilling pirates, with the twisting music in their ears and the roar of the pub all around them. Her hair was much longer now - the colour of straw and dirt. Her fingers were on his face, and her eyes were not closed, but open by the smallest of fractions. Watching him with a keen alertness that never would have existed in the pretty face of Elizabeth Swann. With his arms so tight around her and his lips hot against hers, Jack wondered what had changed her. She wasn't the girl that William Turner had left behind to wait on an island when he left to sail World's End for ten years.

Elizabeth Turner may be caged, but she had become a survivor.


End file.
